Love Your Melon launches first national TV ad campaign

Minneapolis-based knit hat maker Love Your Melon has launched its first national television campaign this week.

With the help of local advertising agency Marketing Architects, Love Your Melon has begun to air 30-second television commercials touting its popular beanies as well as its mission to end childhood cancer.

"When is the last time a hat warmed your head and warmed your heart," the ad spot begins.

Love Your Melon donates 50% of its profits to support nonprofit partners in the fight against pediatric cancer and to help create therapeutic experiences and fund programming initiatives for children with cancer and their families.

In 2012, two University of St. Thomas students founded Love Your Melon. During the last seven years, the company has donated more than $6.2 million and over 175,000 beanies to children fighting cancer. Love Your Melon's brand awareness has grown locally with the company opening its first retail store last year in the North Loop.

"Our goal is to continue to share our mission with new audiences," said Zachary Quinn, Love Your Melon's president and co-founder, in a statement. "We are excited to see the impact this national TV ads campaign can make."

The spot, which has a holiday shopping focus, has begun to air nationally and can be seen on a variety of channels such as Food Network, Lifetime, E!, Comedy Central and more.

"They have done really a good job with word of mouth and social media and that's gotten them very far, but they are looking to continue to expand their message and that's the reason for national TV," said Marketing Architects' chief executive Chuck Hengel, in an interview.

Marketing Architects is handling the campaign strategy, creative development and production, media placement and optimization, and performance attribution for the spots. Hengel said he felt so strongly about Love Your Melon's mission that the agency invested its own money to cover the creative work and production costs for the spot.

"I rarely get exposed to, even though I work with so many different clients, a story that's this strong," Hengel said.

The campaign will evolve depending on response, Hengel said. Marketing Architects plans to create additional spots to build on the campaign with possibly one or two additional spots appearing this year and into early next year. The goal is for the company and marketers to look ahead to the next couple years to see how the television advertising will be scaled, Hengel said.